


i will come in fast & low.

by billielurked



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Childhood Friends, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Internal Conflict, Introspection, Leia Organa Needs a Hug, Leia Organa-centric, Lesbians in Space, Long-Term Relationship(s), Loss, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Snapshots, Star Wars: Leia: Princess of Alderaan Compliant, Tragedy, han and ben are also in this but not quite to the extent to warrant being tagged, leia and holdo love eachother sm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 00:08:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29322942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/billielurked/pseuds/billielurked
Summary: The war is over.But Leia doesn't have the option to pack up her weapons, to tuck away her violence for later, to retreat to the country and recover. No; the war is over, and she has to keep it that way.Throughout the years of dutiful, thankless work, Leia grapples with the choices she made in life. Amilyn Holdo stays by her side through all of it.
Relationships: Amilyn Holdo & Leia Organa, Amilyn Holdo/Leia Organa
Comments: 1
Kudos: 11





	i will come in fast & low.

**Author's Note:**

> i apologize for any lore inconsistencies. i'm taking a lot of liberties here, and my knowledge of the greater star wars lore is limited.

"It'll be better, this time," Han murmurs into the crook of her neck. "I'll be back in a blink."

As a younger woman, that smile would've charmed her. She curls away from the warm feel of it against her neck. 

"You'll wait for me, huh? Right?" He asks like it's nothing. "It won't be long." A hand brushes across her back in two firm sweeps, and just like that, he's gone with a grin and a wave, like it's nothing. There are things to be done- the galaxy cannot sit and wait for them to have their due time together. 

When Leia returns to their home, she peels his trophies off the wall. The clatter cuts through the quiet. His pillow is thrown in the laundry, her own perfume sprayed about to obscure his lingering scent. She tucks his tools and trinkets away, beneath counters, obscured in compartments away from her line of sight. If _he_ won't even stay, she won't let his spectre take up room. It's not fair. At her desk, grip tight around the ring on her finger, she pauses. 

This much she will allow. Leia turns the ring upside down, the small gemstone cutting ever-so-gently into the flesh of her palm.

•

They put a bust of Han Solo in the hall outside one of the Republic courtrooms. It doesn't look like him. He would hate it, if he saw it. He would brag about it, and he would hate it.

He's a hero- he's a criminal. She can't stand to see him on a pedestal, just like she couldn't stand to see him behind bars. 

The hollow bronze irises seem to follow her when she moves, every day, through that very same hallway. It is a cheap replacement for the real thing. Leia starts going another way instead. 

She reads every letter he sends.

•

“You care about too many things you can’t control.” 

Leia laughs. “Isn’t that part of the job?” 

“I don’t know,” Holdo says. “It seems to me the requirements change daily.”

Leia pulls a tissue from her pocket, quietly scrubbing the sticky lipstick off her mouth. “We’ve been doing this since we were sixteen,” she chastises, though there is no sharpness to her tone. “We both know these things will never change. They’re always so-” one hand gestures dismissively towards the empty courtroom behind them, “ _indecisive_. No backbone. Someone has to care.”

“You say _they_ like we’re not one of them.” She exhales slowly, moving to pull Leia along down the hall. Holdo is pragmatic. She knows how these things work. They are each well-trained diplomats, shouldering the weight of their duties with poise and elegance; it’d be silly to think that they have any right to consider themselves different from the rest. 

"You're different," Leia starts. It sounds so silly, but she means it earnestly; she's never known someone like Holdo, so expressive and unusual, so unafraid to stand out in a crowd. When they first met, Leia was impatient and restless, a wild thing, quick to judge and quicker to act on it. It’s hard to become something new and carry none of what you once were. 

In a flurry of bravery, she grasps her friend by the shoulder, spinning the woman to face her. They freeze, arms linked, breath intermingling. 

Whatever confidence she mustered dissipates, hissing like boiling water on snow. It fades around them in a cloud of fog, and Leia can’t let her go, but she won’t let her get any closer either.

This is not the first time they’ve touched. They were girls, once, friends, caught in the tangle of politics but still, only girls, who held hands to seal their friendship. Amilyn was a bizarre, gangly, tall thing consumed by her passion for astrology, always decked from head to toe in odd colors and fabrics, her hair a different color or cut every time she appeared. She kept everyone around her on their toes. Leia relishes in the sweet smell of Amilyn’s perfume. She opens her mouth and snaps it shut with a click.

“General,” says a diplomatic aide, bursting into the hall. They halt at the door, eyes catching on the closeness between the two women, who separate in one swift step. “I’m-” they cough, sidestepping the embarrassment of an apology. “Fanlari may be pulling out of the treaty agreements. You’re needed back in Director Bav’s office.” 

Once the aide’s back is turned, Holdo shifts closer once more. She takes no more than was offered; in one smooth motion she sweeps Leia’s face up to look at her. Then she presses a kiss to her cheek, and pushes her away. 

“Good luck, Leia.” 

•

On a crowded street on Coruscant, Leia sees the familiar silhouette of her childhood friend.

Quicker than a blaster bolt, she shoots down the sidewalk with a newfound purpose; there is a bounce to her steps, and she's quite sure one braid slips from its binding atop her head, but she doesn't care, breathless and overcome, because it's her friend, it's Mirala, who used to chew on her dolls clothes and sword fight her with sticks in the courtyards. They were feisty girls, who barreled over one another like they were at war, who squabbled and spat and bit at each other like animals, who shared beds and baths like small children tend to do. They grew up and apart, but there is no resentment; any familiar face is welcomed.

"Mirala?" She gasps, and the face that turns to look at her is all wrong. Her nose is too small, jaw too slim, hair so close in color but not quite. Not quite. Leia flinches, holding her hand to her chest like she's been burned. Wide-eyed, the stranger pulls away.

"I'm sorry," she says, but the frightened glance back at her doesn't indicate forgiveness. "I'm sorry. I thought.."

There are so many people that Leia will never see again.

Humiliation chases her back up the street, only slower this time, trying to flow naturally into the crowd so the many curious onlookers might grow bored and leave her be. It works; she manages to return home, velvet hood up to obscure her face, never once bothering to fix the loose mourning braid that dangles over one shoulder.

She tries every single day to move beyond Alderaan. Not to abandon it, or cast it aside, because you cannot cast aside the lives of millions- but to cauterize the wound. 

Every day, there is some new reminder. A familiar face on the head of a stranger, the voice of her mother from the mouth of another. She tastes some seasoning on her tongue or hears an instrument in the throng of a band and feels transported back to a world, to another life, that has been ground to dust. It cleaves her in half every time. She struggles to find anything useful to do with her sadness. 

It's impossible to heal a wound that's never done being cut. 

Another night that week, Amilyn Holdo stands on her patio with a glass of something bubbly. She leans against the bannister like she’s never had a worry in her life. Her pantsuit is a disgusting shade of pink, which makes Leia smile. The bend of her back is so relaxed that Leia considers folding herself up against it, draping herself over her, close, arms tucked to her sides- but she doesn’t. She never does. Instead she stands at a respectable distance, with a respectable posture, one hand tight around the glass in her palm and another outstretched to the sky.

"You see that light, right there? To the left of that constellation that looks like a bowl. It's just above." Leia's voice is serious. This isn’t the first time she’s had this conversation, and it won’t be the last.

Holdo nods, leaning closer. "What is it?"

"Alderaan," Leia sighs. "It's Alderaan, still alive. I- I always want to look. I want to see it, while it’s still there. But it makes me nervous too. Someday, the light from the explosion will reach us here.”

“You don’t want to see it happen.” the other woman murmurs. Her voice is so soft that it’s almost lost on the breeze. It’s true- one day that star, with its slow-cast light will travel no longer, will go alight with a bright burst that she has already seen. Leia doesn’t know if she can stand to see it twice. 

One step, then two, and she’s at the taller woman’s side. Holdo’s arm slips about her waist, pulling her snug to her side. There are days where Leia cannot stand to be touched; there are days where she wants nothing more. She looks out at the twinkle of her immortal birthplace, tucked to the waist of someone who listens, and hopes no one else will ever have to pay witness to the end of their world. 

•  
  


They are riding in a transport that's just barely on its last legs. The engine sputters and puffs; their driver is halfway to going mad, mid-argument with the astromech droid that keeps them hurtling through the sky. 

"Organa?" Holdo asks breathlessly, her voice rough and worn by shouting. Her dress is torn, the long train that dangled behind it chopped off and abandoned; there is soot on her face, and blood cakes her nails. 

The coup did not go as planned. The bomb burst too far from them- it did not catch the intended targets, only their bodyguard- but it left them both rattled, hunched over in the seats of the ship, smelling of smoke. 

Leia can’t bring herself to respond. Her body trembles. She sensed it just before it came, before the earth collapsed beneath them, and now she cannot shake off the shock. Holdo scoots closer across from her, her posture tense.

All these years spent largely in the company of others, they have called each other many names. Names like _Senator, Admiral, Captain,_ and _General_ ; names like _Apprentice_ and _My Lady_ , _Miss_ and my _friend_. Organa, and Holdo. They have had to make due with the barrier. The other woman’s soot-smudged face softens. 

“Leia?”

Sucking in a breath, Leia steels herself. The ship pitches lower, her stomach dropping out- she reels forward, catching herself on Amilyn Holdo’s shoulders. “Amilyn-”

Amilyn looks at her, and Leia doesn't look back. She doesn’t push her hands away, and doesn’t come any nearer. They stay like that, frozen, taking comfort in this resigned touch. There is very little they can do, now, but wait to return to their people and make some cold report of the situation, sign paperwork, and write up a eulogy for their guard. The war is over, but it’s hard, sometimes, to keep it that way. Her voice is an anchor. “I know. I know.”

  
  


•

When Leia Organa gives birth to their son, Han is at her side. 

He’s there when Leia starts to scream, to weep, and when the glass on the side table shatters into a thousand pieces. The clock on the wall melts to the floor. The side table rockets through the wall with a resounding _whum_! Han cries, too, ignoring the chaos about them. The Force doesn’t touch him like it touches her-- doesn’t gut him, leave him writhing in the overpowering, all consuming fury of all life bursting inwards as a new one is made. 

It takes hours, but Han waits it out with her. 

Once welcomed to the world, Ben Organa is met first with love. Han holds him like he's the most precious, fragile thing he's ever seen.

He's there for the birth of their son, and he stays for a very long time. He rocks Ben to sleep every night, returns at odd hours with strange trinkets and toys that he’s much too young for but still dangles in front of him like he’s enticing him to get bigger, promising great adventures. When their dark-haired boy wraps his hand around his father’s thumb, she can feel the shockwaves through the Force; it hums with terror, with reverence, with gentleness and love so overwhelming that, for a moment, she’s just as scared as Han is. 

These months brim with hope. Every day is so fat with promises of a bright future that it threatens to burst at the seams, the night bleeding into the morning, her sleep schedule just as scattered as the infants. 

These months are tooth-achingly sweet, and Leia wishes it would never end. Han stayed this time, and she loves him for it.

In the time between the domestic moments, Han neglects to cook. He leaves his things in the way; dishes pile up, paperwork flutters through the house, and he never curls himself around her in bed anymore, lying flat on his back with a snore in his mouth a foot away. He starts to smell like spotchka, and stops showering so much. He wears his shoes in the house and leaves Chewie with the baby- sometimes, she must admit, the warmth of his fur does soothe the child in a way which Han can’t- but he grows scattered with time, lost in the blur of a life he’s not suited for. He tries so hard, every day.

All her life becomes a tangled web of tedium, so tightly interwoven that she can barely squint to see the light outside the little space she’s been afforded.

When Leia’s back bows under the insurmountable pressures that bear down upon her, Amilyn Holdo manifests in her kitchen. She’s there with a spoon in her hand and a pot of something boiling on the stove, and Leia thinks she might cry. 

It is the noble politician who appears on her front porch, or already in her home, with pre-cooked meals and promises of relief. It is her, with her eccentric up-dos and draped gowns, who swaddles her son in his room and gently sways all the restless tears out of him. When Leia appears in court again with her son bound in a sling to her chest, it is Amilyn Holdo who stands by her side and takes him sometimes when her back starts to hurt, gently unwinding the scarf from Leia’s middle to wrap it around herself, holding her baby to her chest. 

When she goes home in the evening, there is a prim, proper woman at her side. Her hair is a shock of bright blue; on her head she wears some odd headdress and, in her hand, she holds Leia's own. When they reach the front door, she lets her go.

•

Ben Organa is five years old when he first lashes out with the force. 

She felt it in him; knew he was strong with it. She tried to train him just how Breha had trained her-- to envision a beach by nighttime, to hear the steady murmur of the water on the shore, flowing rhythmically, in tune with everything. _I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me._ She tries to teach him this, embracing him, and he thrashes and screams, hitting her arm so hard in his scramble to escape that she's left nursing a small bruise hours later. _I am one with the Force, and-_

After that, she learns not to cage him in. Never to make him feel trapped. Instead she sings to him through the Force, calm songs she learned from her parents- her real parents, who raised her- and it works better. It's not perfect, but it's better. There, in the pathway between their minds, she and her child can meet in the middle. She doesn’t hold his anger, his fear, against him; she was once a girl too, frightened, screaming in the middle of the marketplace because she could feel too much. The world was too loud. 

She knows she should call Luke. She _will_ call him. It was him who trained her, him who understood this struggle more than anyone. Except-- she, too, understands. She stood over her twin with a crackling lightsaber in hand and felt the powerful, alluring adrenaline of the Force. She remembers the looming silhouette of the man who claimed to be her father and can't help but think that, of the twins, she is most like him. _I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me._

She is an Organa, never a Skywalker. Maybe an Amidala. Rarely a Solo. 

She should call Luke, so he might help her son. But Leia- Leia needs help, too.

So she calls Amilyn Holdo.

Just as fast and impulsively as she was summoned, the other woman is on her doorstep, dressed halfway to casual in a way that Leia hasn’t seen since they shared a sleeping space in the ambassadorial quarters of some Empire ship. The fabric of her shirt is a revolting shade of vivid green. 

They haven’t spoken much outside of polite society since Ben was born, and it shows in the respectful distance between them. She does not cross the threshold without invitation, anymore, hesitating, bright eyes peering carefully about the corner of the door frame as though she might be chased out by whatever waits within. 

Another time, later, Leia will feel guilty about this initial reaction. She can’t even fathom it right now, drowned already in her multitudes of troubles; she files it away for later concern, leaving a note for herself that this is something she must apologize for, mustn’t let fade away like it was nothing. They step into her home, and Leia knows it's a mess. Amilyn steps over Ben’s toys and Han’s things without the slightest reaction, like they are a natural part of the landscape. 

Many hours after, when Ben has settled from his outburst of screams and Threepio has been firmly instructed to sit _quietly_ when in the nursery, they settle at the dining table. They do not touch, still split apart by time, but the mild animosity went away quickly. “He’s a good boy,” Leia finishes once her long rant is done, “But it’s… it’s harder than I thought it would be. I’m tangled in all these political disputes. I’m a general, a mother, a wife. Parenting right now is.. a lot.” 

“You’re good at it, nonetheless.” Amilyn tilts her head to one side, sharp eyes boring deep into her. “You can’t anticipate everything. You’re smart, I’ll give you that- and your foresight almost frightens me- but you’re just one person. You can be good at something, and it can still tire you out.” 

“Yeah,” she exhales. “But I’m a mother. It’s more than just a skill you-- you-- get _good_ at. It’s supposed to come naturally.” 

A long pause. “Why was I the top candidate for this conversation?” Amilyn asks quietly, finger brushing along the rim of the table. “Isn’t Han around to help? He’s a _parent_ , too.” 

Leia resists the temptation to press her face into her palms. She has no patience for an interrogation today, well-meaning or not. The smile she plasters on her face is only half-truthful, embittered by the length of her day and the depth of her concerns. “I just wanted someone else to talk to.” 

Amilyn sees right through her. 

She always has. Ever since that day she discovered her for what she was- a rebel spy, Bail’s extra set of eyes, the unsuspecting infiltrator clothed in pure white- Holdo has had no trouble uncovering the truth. It is not difficult to lie to your enemies; Leia learned how to do that when she was very small. To lie to your friends is a challenge she wasn’t quite ready for. 

She didn’t think she’d find a friend there, among the Imperial Ambassadors, all wide-eyed children with hopes that they might infiltrate the leviathan and mold it from the inside. She knows, now, that the leviathan doesn’t buckle to the naive desires of those it feeds on. 

She sees right through her, and Leia knows it; but she cares about her enough not to force the truth. They both know she is not ready to confess. Whatever it is she wants to confess, anyways. She's not sure. She's never sure. Are people ever sure? 

Seeking out some warmth in the boundless, endless gap that separates her current life from the one she lived a long time ago, Leia scoots her chair closer. They sit shoulder to shoulder, skin brushing, until Amilyn gently lowers her head to her shoulder, releasing one long, drawn out exhale. 

Once, a long time ago, she told Amilyn what the color purple represented on Alderaan; humility, reverence, new beginnings. Her hair is purple, now, pressed against her neck, gently tickling her cheek. Their hands intertwine on the table. The day gets a little easier. 

•

The war is over. 

But Leia doesn't have the option to pack up her weapons, to tuck away her violence for later, to retreat to the country and recover. No; the war is over, and she has to keep it that way. 

Sometimes, Leia wishes the war never ended. Because when there's a war, when the world is about to end and whole planets are being snuffed out, there's no such thing as guilt. Guilt demands foresight; it demands the anticipation of shame. 

Who, if everyone has been incinerated, will remain to accuse you? 

Sometimes, Leia wishes the world would end because then she could be brave, and reckless, and make her cruel choices without embarrassment. She could lean in and touch Amilyn Holdo's face, could pluck her from a crowd and drag her in some back room, sink her fingers into that hair- what color is it now? she can't remember- she could take Amilyn for all she is and, shamelessly, with all the passion in her body, kiss her senseless.

But this thing between them, this tender, careful bond- it's not a connection made in war. It is not the love she has for Han, it is not young and impulsive, they are not bound together for life by experiences they'd both never trade, yet still wish never happened. She and Holdo are just two people, trying their best with the cards they were dealt.

What she and Amilyn Holdo have is calm. It is a peacetime bond, forged not in fire but rather patiently, and thoughtfully. The feelings she has towards Holdo grow softer by the day. They seemed so harmless. Friendship pulled her in, and now the proximity feels more tempting than it should.

She blinks, and finds herself outside Amilyn’s apartment with a bottle of wine in her hand, the other poised to knock.

It swings open, the light from within casting her in harsh shadows. “Leia, darling.” 

Her hair is loose about her shoulders, the longest she’s ever seen it. Leia tucks her hands to her chest, gripping the bottle like an anchor to keep from reaching out to touch it. “Hi, Ami.” 

They spend hours doing nothing worthwhile; they debate the newest disputes of the court until that loses its luster, turning to the wine and their silly holodramas instead. Here, in Amilyn’s apartment, her hair loose and shoes tucked away by the door, intimacy comes easily to her. They giggle over their shared jokes, reminiscing on their clumsy ambassadorial days, caught up in the momentary joy of being away from the rest of the world. Leia calls her silly, and Amilyn teases her for her small stature; this earns a playful push, a stumble backwards onto the couch. 

Close like this, Leia propped on her outstretched arms above her, they laugh together. Breathlessly, she freezes in place, looking down at her friend with such a longing in her eyes she’s sure it must be contagious. “Amilyn, you drive me crazy.”

Amilyn leans in. Leia puts one hand to her jaw so she might be as close as they can get. As close as is permitted. Beneath her hand, there is the steady hum of her heart- unflinching, low, constant. 

Moments like these demand admissions. Intimacy is an act of revealing oneself; you can't love someone, not really, can't tuck them into your chest unless they know why it is that you want to. She swallows. "I.. you.." 

"It's okay," Amilyn murmurs into her palm. "It's okay. You don't need to say it." 

"I don't?" Leia rasps. 

“You don’t. I know.”

The taller woman pulls her down to her chest, tucking her face into the hollow of her throat. A hand brushes her back, and she can feel the warm gust of her breath behind her ear. They lie there together for some time, wordless, simply listening to the steady rise and fall of their breaths. If this is all they can have, Leia can accept that. She will take anything she can have. It has to be enough.

•

When Ben Organa is ten years old, he is sent away to live with Luke at the Academy. 

“You can always come home, you know. You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”

“I know, mom.”

“We’ll come back for you,” Han interjects. “In a heartbeat.” 

“I know,” Ben says, and squeezes past them to look out the windows of the cockpit.

She thinks perhaps he will feel safer there, shrouded in secrecy, living shoulder to shoulder with others like him. 

In some ways, this worries Leia more than it comforts her. He's a lot like his mother; she too wakes up thrashing in her sweat-soaked sheets, frightened by the man in black that visits her dreams. She knows Ben sees him just as often as she does. Luke told her once that he _invites_ him in; that he sees him young and kind, with a bright soul, shrouded in blue. They call him different names. Sometimes she relents and calls him _Anakin_ , because it makes Luke smile, but when he calls him _father_ it's too far for her. She has a father already. She has no need for another. 

Yavin IV is humid this time of year. The wind brings no relief. Han stands at her side when they descend onto the platform. Ben looks out over the endless hills of green that stretch on in every direction. Birds fly overhead in tight formations, keeping close to one another. 

Luke looks at them all with love in his eyes and says, “There you are. I’ve been waiting an awfully long time.” 

•

Han often left for selfish reasons; he left for his own sake, to satisfy that restlessness within him.

She did love him, in her own way; then again, she figures that is the only way to love another person. She still loves him; he occupies a part of her mind at all times. He is the silly laugh that rings out to break the tension. He keeps her humble, and humored, keeps life flowing in easy, reckless waves. Han Solo is her reminder that life is wild and unpredictable, and that this is a good thing. 

She doesn't know if she can give him up. Most days, she doesn't want to. 

Once, a long time ago, Han told her he wouldn’t get in the way of her love for Luke, back when he misunderstood the connection between them. _When he comes back, I won’t get in the way_. What a careless, bleeding heart he hid beneath it all. He will understand, won’t he? She wants him in her life, and in Ben’s. She wants her dear friend. But Ben isn’t here to tether them together. Ben’s room is empty, his things moved to his new living space. The walls seem whiter than before. 

When Han comes home with her, he seems to already anticipate what comes next. The house is so empty without their son. So quiet. The tension between them is palpable, and they haven’t had a moment between them to really discuss what would happen to _them_ after their boy left. How their life may change. 

His bags are dropped carelessly by the door; Chewie is instructed to wait on the patio, to give them a moment together. Leia throws her arms around him, and the embrace is so warm, so familiar, and she knows every corner of him by now. “Han, I don’t know what to do now.” 

It’s time for the hard part. She exhales slowly and flees to sit upon the sofa, and Han follows close at her ankle. It’s too much. Her heart hammers in her chest. He drops to his knees at her feet, one hand softly cupping her cheek.

Han thinks he's done something wrong, that much is clear, and this is how he begs his forgiveness. "Hey, Leia.” No nicknames, this time. “Hey. It's alright."

Leia folds herself over him, hands brushing through his hair. She gathers all the confidence she can muster, and braves the unknown. "I have something I need to tell you."

•

It doesn’t happen right away. To let go of an old life takes time; to welcome someone into the hollow shell of her once very lived-in home feels frightening. Leia takes it in slow steps. First, she invites Amilyn over for dinner more often, then for lunch, until most of their meals are taken together. 

They see one another in the halls every day and say very little, but the brush of their knuckles as they pass is enough. Leia starts leaving some of her things in Amilyn’s apartment, and she does the same, until their possessions are so equally split that it starts to become inconvenient. She welcomes the inconvenience, for a while, because it offers all the sparkling excuses she could possibly need to appear on the other woman’s doorstep looking for a comb, or a slip, or a pair of socks she’s hopelessly lost. Amilyn lets her leave a photo of Ben on her windowsill. Leia keeps a photo of Amilyn on her dresser.

Their lives weave together in such a tangle that there’s no discernible boundary between them. When one of them leaves for diplomatic missions, the other still visits their empty quarters, continuing life as it had gone on before. They wait patiently, because that is what they have always done. 

One night, Leia’s patience snaps. She’s only human, and cannot be the perfect image of unrelenting strength every day of her life. There is only so much love she can possess before it pours forth from her in a wave.

"You know, way back when, _you_ told me you only liked males." Amilyn's smile is mirthful and bright.

"I was a kid! I just hadn't thought about it enough. It's not like I had much time to figure it out." Leia snorts, pressing closer to her side. "I also thought _orange_ was my favorite color."

"Well, you were right about one thing. Orange is a pretty great color."

Tangled on her bed- or their bed, she’s not sure anymore, because the boundaries and the lines and the walls have lost all meaning- Leia rolls atop her and grins. “I love you so much.”

“I love you in so many ways that I’ll never be able to put into words.”

She snorts like a child, pushing her teasingly. “You say the strangest things.” 

“You like it.” 

“Oh, shut _up_.”

“I always did tell you that our signs were compatible.” 

“I don’t listen to advice given by stars, Amilyn,” she laughs. “I prefer concrete evidence.”

“I see. Let me think- is this reliable enough for you?” Amilyn asks, and gathers Leia into her arms into an embrace so tight she think she might melt, a kiss so warm and urgent that it sears through her soul and leaves her dangling on the edge, desperate for more. 

Leia gasps, curling inwards, laughing. She shakes her woozy head and whispers; “I don’t know. I don’t know yet. Show me again.”

Amilyn shows her again, and again, and again. 

She never stops proving it to her, nearly every single day for two decades.

•

Ben is long gone. 

Her son, once kind and good, steadfast, overwhelmed by the all-consuming noise of the world, who nestled against Holdo’s chest as a baby, who grasped Han’s thumb like an anchor pulling him back down to earth, who slept in Leia’s bed until he was three because he was frightened, has been molded into something he’s not. Still; Leia searches for him. What else can she do? 

Amilyn, who spent twenty years by her side, has now been gone for four. They have seen little of each other. She searches for Ben, too, and for all those who gather about him in the shadows. Their intentions when they find him are very different. 

The throng of ghosts that trails behind Leia grows bigger by the day. She is pursued by every platoon or squadron she’s ever sent out to their deaths, every friend she’s failed to say goodbye to, her mothers and her fathers, by the children her son and her father killed, by the entire population of her planet. They jostle her with every step, make her movements slow, stiffen her spine, wear down on her resolve. Han is among them now, and she keeps him close, his memory a talisman that guides her forward. 

Life is unpredictable, he reminds her, and this is a good thing. 

Leia must keep faithful to that doctrine. This is not the time to waver.

She knows a good thing when she sees it; once more, hardened by age yet never once worn down by it, Amilyn Holdo stands before her, hands outstretched. Her hair is still purple, for humility, for reverence, for new beginnings. 

“There you are, my love.” Amilyn sits at her bedside and clasps her hand in her own. On her finger is one of the rings they exchanged many years ago. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

•

Once, a long time ago, Amilyn said something that Leia didn’t understand. 

“I hope it’s dangerous. I want to get more comfortable with the nearness and inevitability of death.”

She was young, then, still new to the world in ways she would never have admitted to. Consumed by the earnest belief that hope might spare all things, Leia was a child, unused to the nearness of death, unfamiliar with the idea that one might want to skate by and get a taste of it. As the years went by, she grew to understand the sentiment. What they did- who they were- demanded that one grow familiar with the anticipation of dying for a greater cause. 

The opportunity arrives decades later. It’s dangerous, and it's inevitable, just like she wanted. The _Supremacy_ looms in the sky above them, a great leviathan with no concern for the naive desires of those it feeds on. 

Amilyn Holdo dies. 

Amilyn Holdo dies, because that's what people do. 

She dies, because the leviathan can’t be changed from the inside. It must be obliterated. The light of the two ships colliding is so bright it makes Leia’s eyes burn, the reflection casting bright sparks and flashes of light across the reflective surfaces of the transport walls. Leia already knows how it sounds when something bursts open in space; it sounds like nothing at all. The fragments of metal leap out in all directions, cascading through the splintering light. When Leia was nineteen, she did not shudder or look away from the destruction of her world. She doesn’t look away this time, either.

“Don’t make me wait too long.” she murmurs to the wreckage. The silhouette of the ship recedes as they lower into the atmosphere; she never takes her eye off it, watching as it, too, becomes nothing more than another bright point in the sky. 

**Author's Note:**

> When I die, I will come in fast and low. I will stick the landing. There will be no confusion. The dead will make room for me.  
> \- _Richard Siken_


End file.
